The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Celebrated Stanford University historian Clayborne Carson is the director and editor of the Martin Luther King Papers Project; with thousands of Kings essays, notes, letters, speeches, and sermons at his disposal, Carson has organized Kings writings into a posthumous autobiography. In an early student essay, King prophetically penned: We cannot have an enlightened democracy with one great group living in ignorance.... We cannot have a nation orderly and sound with one group so ground down and thwarted that it is almost forced into unsocial attitudes and crime. Such statements, made throughout Kings career, are skillfully woven together into a coherent narrative of the quest for social justice. The autobiography delves, for example, into the philosophical training King received at Morehouse College, Crozer Theological Seminary, and Boston University, where he consolidated the teachings of Afro-American theologian Benjamin Mays with the philosophies of Locke, Rousseau, Gandhi, and Thoreau. Through Kings voice, the reader intimately shares in his trials and triumphs, including the Montgomery Boycott, the 1963 I Have a Dream Speech, the Selma March, and the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize. In one of his last speeches, King reminded his audience that in the final analysis, God does not judge us by the separate incidents or the separate mistakes that we make, but by the total bent of our lives. Carsons skillful editing has created an original argument in Kings favor that draws directly from the source, illuminating the circumstances of Kings life without deifying his person. --Eugene Holley Jr.

Author: Clayborne Carson

Language: English

Edition: 1ST

Binding: Hardcover

Pages: 416

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Publication Date: 1998-11-01